Father Vladyslav Shiman, rector of the Church of the Holy Intercession (OCU) in Sarat, spoke about the future plans of his parish. Earlier, the national flag of Ukraine was raised outside the church on his initiative.
As the priest explained in an interview with bessarabiainform.com, he saw this practice in other Orthodox countries and decided to introduce it in Sarat as a tribute to patriotism.
In addition, the community plans to continue active charitable efforts to support the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Last year, parishioners raised over UAH 300,000 for the needs of the Army, including for the purchase of UAVs and anti-drone equipment.
Father Vladyslav emphasized patriotism of his parishioners, who are actively involved in projects to support anything that’s truly Ukrainian. In particular, last year they raised funds for the purchase of liturgical books in the Ukrainian language after the congregation switched to the Ukrainian language services.
“Parishioners who attend the Holy Intercession Church are so patriotic that even I have something to learn from them. Any request for help, so that there is more Ukrainian, finds support among them,” the priest emphasizes.
Currently, among the Orthodox believers of the south of Odesa, there are many who are still hesitating whether to join the Orthodox Church of Ukraine or not. Vladyslav Shiman gave the following advice to such believers.
“There are no such clever words to attract a faithful, unbreakable person to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, but they must see the main thing, not live by someone else’s mind, but their own. I would also ask why it happened that in 2014-2015, some priests did not even agree to bury the fallen soldiers. What has now changed for these representatives of the church?
I also wanted each person to ask themselves: who is to blame for this large-scale war in Ukraine? Maybe not everything was done to prevent this, and perhaps some churchmen were in the wrong? After all, we all know that the church often took part in political games.
I have to state from my own observations: evil cannot lead to anything good. When people say bad things about OCU and other denominations, let people think about where they attend services,” the cleric said, addressing believers.
